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Paul Ryan Throws in the Towel on Entitlement Reform

JOSHUA ROBERTS

By Michael Rainey

January 12, 2018

MOST POPULAR

Speaker of the House Paul Ryan has long wanted to restructure entitlement programs, and there was some speculation that Republicans might try to reform Medicare and Social Security in the wake of their big tax victory in December. But President Trump has indicated that he’s not interested in tackling such a difficult and contentious issue this year, and Republicans appear to be giving up on the possibility of making big changes to entitlements through the budget process.

Ryan admitted as much Friday at an event in Wisconsin, saying "I don't see us tackling it this year."

The Republican congressman said the problem was that the lack of agreement in Washington: "You're going to have to find bipartisan consensus to fix these thorny, long-term problems, and we don't have that right now."